Thanks for the ideas, everyone. Quite a diversity of opinion! As I thought, it's not as straightforward a question as it might appear to be.

For the record, the issue has nothing to do with legality. No one is implying that the police will come knocking on your door if you delete a cookie on your personal computer. Rather, it's a question of ethics. Lots of perfectly legal things can be highly unethical. So perhaps stealing, which is illegal, wasn't the right analogy.

In any event, the most persuasive argument for me is that if someone has begun charging for a product or service and you think that's unfair, the proper response (assuming it's something you can live without) is to say, "Screw it. I'll go somewhere else." The fact you can get it for free doesn't mean you should. If enough people are pissed off and let the New York Times X know, then they'll get the message and change their policy.

I'll make sure to let Y see this discussion.

Religious disputes are like arguments in a madhouse over which inmate really is Napoleon.

I can't stand the current system, I truthfully feel it's not exactly ethical to demand money for something that in general didn't require it before. What has changed about X's product to warrant that money and how did they determine it? Are all previously free articles still free? It's quite unethical to me to make a free product and then repackage it as not free. As far as news articles, any article after the fact can then be considered fair game to make cost since it is intellectual property that has never hit free domain. The rest did.

As far as internet piracy I have the opinion that reading 11 free articles is the same as buying a used book. X doesn't make any money in either scenario. While people do have rights to what they create there's a large distinction with the fact that those rights often get nullified after the sale. Oftentimes businesses entering the internet market seem to believe that with virtual products they never give away ownership. Say I buy a CD and then hand it to a friend who hands it to a friend. Nothing unethical in any way is happening during this time but that CD keeps changing hands. Companies act like just because the actual data remains on their website or on their disc that the copy of data isn't taking the same role as a real life product.

X can demand whatever they like, but that does not keep them always in the right. If the 10 page restriction is altered by getting on another computer then there is no ethical breach here. The idea is available free in some way and simply has a tethered exception of a sum. Once that article was available for free it hit the free domain. People tend to run business models as if there are no shades of grey, but few products sell all that well without customer support. That support is obtained by their ownership of the product being traded for money. The company has to accept that in some way if a requirement for access is money they are giving the user something in some way permanent.

You want to bring up Kant and his simplified ethical standards? If everyone was deleting their cookies to view X's site, X would come up with something better. That X offered 10 free views per computer opened it up to the prospect of everyone leeching. I seriously wish people would get to the point where they just have a tip jar. If X's product was so important to it's readers that a monthly subscription seemed viable, X could've either made full articles member only or stated that there is a need for money and asked users to donate in order to continue recieving quality articles. In this model X has already allowed Y free complete access due to the fact that the restriction is placed on the computer. All Y would need to do is go to a library and comp hop.

I'm not a non believer, I believe in the possibility of anything. I just don't let the actuality of something be determined by a 3rd party.

Ah yes, the donations... Now that is a concept I like. You put up something you think deserves some money, but you give it for free and you leave the "DONATIONS" part somewhere visible. Those who like you will give you some money, those that don't care will not.

I saw a few great examples how this works much, much better than just prohibiting everything until people pay.

Free-With-Donations scheme gave us great net-show like Pioneer One, that was funded completely with donations and it is 100% free to download from from their original site. Wasteland 2 is a new game that is in development after the makers of the game asked the public can they and will they give them 900k $ to start working on a game, instead of 900k, they got 2.9m $.

This tells us that those who deserve, get the money. Make something worthy and you will have money for it. Simple really.

I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours.-Hunter S. Thompson

(19-06-2012 09:24 PM)cufflink Wrote: In any event, the most persuasive argument for me is that if someone has begun charging for a product or service and you think that's unfair, the proper response (assuming it's something you can live without) is to say, "Screw it. I'll go somewhere else."

Let's take this a bit further, cufflink. Y always uses the "private browsing" feature in his browser 'cause Y ain't stupid. Y don't keep track of how many times they hit a particular web site 'cause why the fuck would I? Y don't know that the New York Times X limits free views. Clearly (to me at least) Y is not behaving unethically at this point. Now Y is told that the New York Times X wants to limit free views. If Y continues their current behavior of not counting how many times they hit a particular web site are they suddenly behaving unethically by virtue of that knowledge of X's desire? Do I need to suddenly assume the burden of counting how many times I've looked at you this month just because cufflink thinks I should pay to look at him for each glance over 10/month in order to maintain my ethics? That's gonna be a hard argument to make to Girly.

huuuh??? I never pressed the reply button after writing my post? Darn it... I should stop letting work getting between the forum and me....
ok here we go again:

I think everyone has the right to do with their stuff as they please.
If someone wants to give whatever for free, that's fine but if this person decides at some point, to ask for cash for their stuff, it's fine because that stuff is the person's own stuff (whatever, a service, articles, or who cares....)

Now from the other side:
Position 1: "It has always been for free, I am not going to start paying for it now, I will find a way around it." Fine! Understandable, because it feels unfair. Not cool to find a way around it but their own fault to not secure it better if they want to sell it.
Position 2: "I can find everything for free on the internet, I am moving to another <insert stuff>." Fine! Staying legal.
Position 3: "This is unfair, I am going to tell everyone that this <insert stuff> is a prick and unfair and shouldn't have done this and wow I am so mad and don't care." Not fine! As i said, the person can do with the stuff what he/she wants, it's his/hers! If you don't like the decision, this person makes, move on.

Comes down to what you feel comfortable doing actually IMO it's that simple.

Ethics I feel uncomfortable with because essentially in the end when you ask "do you think this is ethical?", you are asking me to say what *you* should do. But the only person I'm qualified to really give an opinion on that topic is what *I* should do. (A gift for the grammarians out there, I'm trying to give y'all a heart attack ).

In ce particular case la, je would simply be quite happy to have found a way to nick stuff But then I hardly ever bother to read news sites anyway so I'd probably never hit their ten article limit...

(22-06-2012 05:52 PM)Leela Wrote: huuuh??? I never pressed the reply button after writing my post? Darn it... I should stop letting work getting between the forum and me....
ok here we go again:

I think everyone has the right to do with their stuff as they please.
If someone wants to give whatever for free, that's fine but if this person decides at some point, to ask for cash for their stuff, it's fine because that stuff is the person's own stuff (whatever, a service, articles, or who cares....)

Now from the other side:
Position 1: "It has always been for free, I am not going to start paying for it now, I will find a way around it." Fine! Understandable, because it feels unfair. Not cool to find a way around it but their own fault to not secure it better if they want to sell it.
Position 2: "I can find everything for free on the internet, I am moving to another <insert stuff>." Fine! Staying legal.
Position 3: "This is unfair, I am going to tell everyone that this <insert stuff> is a prick and unfair and shouldn't have done this and wow I am so mad and don't care." Not fine! As i said, the person can do with the stuff what he/she wants, it's his/hers! If you don't like the decision, this person makes, move on.

Fine. Girly gives you 10 free views of my posts on TTA per month, Leela. I want a penny per view after that.

(22-06-2012 06:11 PM)Leela Wrote: exactly! I would most likely be the one who moves on. ethics ... yahwelllll.... you see. I don't care that much.

Best to just put me on your ignore list now lest you encounter an ethical dilemma.

(22-06-2012 05:52 PM)Leela Wrote: I care about moral, not ethics.

That's the opposite of my circumstance. I couldn't give less of a shit about someone's morality or ethics as long as they don't infringe, or otherwise impinge, upon mine. But as a civil servant, my employer requires me to take annual ethics training. They tell me explicitly what they consider unethical. Problem solved. I lose my job and could be imprisoned for violating those ethics. Privately browsing the New York Times X ain't been mentioned.